An AI assistant for photographers: the business side, not the editing

A different category from editing tools

Culling and editing software, and studio management systems with contracts, invoices and online booking, are different categories of tool. This assistant is neither. It does not edit or cull RAW files, it does not replace a studio CRM, and it is not a booking widget. It is a general assistant that works in your own email, calendar and sheets, takes instructions in plain words and can run a job on a schedule.

If you already use a studio system, keep it. The assistant is for the loose ends around it: the messages in your inbox, the notes in your head, the dates in your calendar.

The jobs that suit it

Each of these starts from something that already exists: an email a client sent, your calendar, a note from a couple, a sheet you keep.

Replying to an enquiry

A couple emails asking about your wedding packages for next June. You forward or paste it to the assistant in your chat app. It reads the email in your Gmail, checks your calendar for that date, and saves a reply in your Gmail Drafts using the packages and prices you gave it. You read the draft, change what you want and send it yourself. If a detail is missing, such as travel costs for a venue far away, tell it to say so in the draft or ask you, rather than guess.

Checking a date and holding it

Asking “am I free on 12 June?” works from your Google Calendar: the assistant can look for free time on a day and list what is booked around it. It can also add a hold or a booking as a calendar event when you tell it to. It sees only the calendars you connected, so anything you keep somewhere else, such as paper or another calendar app, is invisible to it.

Reminders and prep notes before a shoot

Hermes can run a scheduled job. You can ask for a message the evening before each shoot with the time, the place and anything you noted, taken from the calendar event. It arrives in your chat app. A reminder to the client is a separate matter: by default, have it write that as a draft for you to send.

Shot lists from a client’s notes

Paste the notes a couple sent, such as who must be photographed together and which moments matter, and ask for a shot list ordered by the day’s timeline. This is writing work, which an assistant does well. You still decide what is realistic for the light and the schedule.

Gallery delivery and thank-you emails

After the gallery is ready, ask for a delivery email in your tone, with a gap where you paste the gallery link. The assistant does not upload galleries or generate links; it writes the email around the link you give it, as a draft.

A bookings and payments tracker

If you want a record, the assistant can create a Google Sheet and add a row per booking when you say so: client, date, package, deposit due, status. It can also read the sheet back, such as “which deposits are still due?” Treat it as your own notes. It does not see your bank, so the status column is only as true as what you told it.

Caption drafts

You can ask for a few caption options for a set of pictures, from your description. It writes them in the chat for you to copy and post yourself.

A realistic week

Imagine Mei, a family and newborn photographer with a small studio, who connected Gmail, Google Calendar and one Google Sheet and linked Telegram. She told the assistant once:

Here are my packages and prices: Mini 30 minutes, Classic 90 minutes, Full Day.
Reply in a warm, short style and sign off with my first name.
Never send an email. Save every reply as a draft in Gmail.
If a date is booked, say so and offer the nearest free day.

• Monday: three enquiries came in. She forwarded each to Telegram, and the assistant checked the calendar and left three drafts. She sent two as written and rewrote one.
• Wednesday evening: the scheduled job messaged her the next day’s shoot: time, address from the event, and the note she had added.
• Friday: after a newborn session she asked for the delivery email draft, pasted the gallery link and sent it.

Nothing here needed new software, only her existing Gmail, calendar and a sheet.

“Never send” is an instruction, not a lock. Once Gmail is connected, the assistant is able to send email if asked or if it misreads you. Keep that line in every email job and glance at your Sent folder now and then.

What it cannot do, and what stays with you

• Edit or cull your shoots. It is not a RAW editor or a culling tool, and it does not sort a shoot for you.
• Take payments or sign contracts. It cannot charge a card, issue an invoice through a payment provider or collect a signature. If it keeps a sheet of deposits, that sheet is a note, not a ledger.
• Decide on copyright, licensing or releases. What a client may do with the images, and whether you hold a model release, is your decision and your paperwork. It can draft a sentence from wording you supply; it should not invent your terms.
• Replace your judgement with clients. Ask it to save every client message as a draft that you read and send. That is your instruction, not a lock: once Gmail is connected it is able to send. Keep messages to replies, existing clients and people who asked for a reminder.
• Answer phone calls or take bookings on a website. It works in email and chat.
• Promise more work. Faster replies may help, but nobody can promise more bookings.

Client details and client photos

Names, addresses, dates and family details are personal data, and looking after them is your responsibility. This page does not tell you what the law requires where you work; check that with the right source for your area.

When the assistant drafts a reply, the text it works from goes to an AI model provider to produce the answer. The same applies to a picture you send it. For that reason, do not send client photographs to the assistant unless a job needs it, and be extra careful with children’s pictures. Most of the jobs above need only text.

Setting it up

On ReadyHermes, the Apps panel connects Gmail, Google Calendar and Google Sheets: you choose the app, sign in to Google, and it shows under your connected apps. You can also ask the assistant in chat to connect an app. If your assistant is paused, the panel asks you to choose a plan first.

If you run Hermes yourself, it includes a Google Workspace skill, set up with your own Google credentials, which is more work than pressing Connect. See how to install Hermes Agent, and Hermes Agent skills and MCP for other ways to add tools. A self-hosted assistant only runs scheduled jobs while its machine is on.

1. Write your packages, prices and the way you like to reply, in a few lines.
2. Connect Gmail and Google Calendar, then tell the assistant to leave drafts and send nothing.
3. Try it on one real enquiry. Correct the draft in plain words and ask it to keep that rule. Only then ask for a reminder job.

For the wider picture, see an AI assistant for small business owners and an AI agent for a one-person business. The calendar side has its own page: an AI calendar assistant. For other trades, see the use cases, and for the email question specifically, can ChatGPT answer my emails?

Photographer admin on ReadyHermes

ReadyHermes runs your own Hermes Agent for you, so there is nothing to install: a new assistant is ready in about 10 seconds and you chat with it in the browser or from Telegram, WhatsApp, Discord, WeChat or Lark. The free trial lasts one hour: use it to connect Gmail and ask for a first draft reply. If you choose a plan, changes to settings that restart the assistant take about a minute.

To be plain about what it is not: ReadyHermes has no photo editing, no gallery hosting, no online booking page, no contracts and no payments. It also has no connection to studio systems such as Pixifi or ShootQ. It is the assistant that handles the messages around them.